We recently shared six conceptual visions for the transformation of Los Angeles’ Union Station. Upon the release of the vision boards, the team’s proposals (EE&K, a Perkins Eastman Company, in association with UNStudio; IBI Group with Foster+Partners; Grimshaw with Gruen; Moore Ruble Yudell Architects and Planners, with Ten Arquitectos and West 8; NBBJ with Ingenhoven Architects; and Renzo Piano Building Workshop with Parsons Transportation Group Inc.) sparked much public interest. As we reported earlier, the Metro staff will recommend a winner to the Metro board on June 28th, but in the meantime, we’d like to share a closer look at some of the proposals.
UNStudio’s proposal with EE&K imagines Union Station as a multi-modal transit hub filled with mixed use development and outdoor spaces. The conceptual vision board explores possibilities for the station and its surrounding areas, highlighting a key integration of transportation and outdoor park spaces with its “green loop” strategy.
Dubai shipbuilder Drydocks World has signed on with Switzerland’s BIG InvestConsult, on behalf of partner Deep Ocean Technology (DOT), to become the sole construction contractor of the futuristic Water Discus Underwater Hotels in the Middle East. Tailored to the luxurious lifestyle, aspiring divers and marine life enthusiasts, the patent-protected concept by DOT is comprised of disc-shaped volumes that are both above and below the water’s surface, exploring the depths of the ocean while taking advantage of the warm climate.
Continue after the break for more on the Water Discus Underwater Hotels.
As we announced back in February, Swiss architects Herzog & de Meuron and their Chinese collaborator Ai Weiwei will design this year’s Serpentine Gallery Pavilion at Hyde Park in London, a special edition that will be part of the London 2012 Festival, the culmination of the Cultural Olympiad. This will be the trio’s first collaborative built structure in the UK.
Back then, it was announced that their design will explore the hidden history of the previous installations (see all the previous pavilions in our infographic), with eleven columns under the lawn of the Serpentine, representing the past pavilions and a twelfth column supporting a floating platform roof 1.4 metres above ground, which looks like a reflecting water-like surface in the renderings. The plan of the pavilion is based on a mix of the 11 previous pavilions’ layouts, pavilions that are represented as excavated foundations from which a new cork cladded landscape appears, as an archeological operation.
Architects and designers everywhere know the amount of time it takes to get accurate floor plan measurements with a measuring tape, a pencil, and some graph paper, but now there’s an app that gives you the convenience of measuring right in the palm of your hand in a matter of minutes. The Magic Plan app, conveniently named, simply asks for certain areas of a specific room and is able to assemble a floor plan for you. The app also includes tutorials on how to use it effectively and get fully adjusted to it. Above is a video to give you an idea of how this magic app works and some images can be viewed after the break.
Tomorrow, Amazon representatives are scheduled to present their design for a three-block proposal that will introduce three new towers to the Seattle skyline and add 3.3 million square feet of office space to the downtown area. Quite possibly the largest development ever proposed downtown, the complex will consume five acres in the Denny Triangle Urban Village that is currently being used for parking, the Sixth Avenue Inn and the King Cat Theater.
Continue reading for more information on the Denny Triangle project.
A mix of twenty local and internationally renowned firms have been invited to participate in a design competition seeking “creative and practical design concepts” on thirteen acres of prime waterfront real estate at the historic Fort Mason Center in San Francisco. Although mostly comprised of parking lots and former military buildings, the site attracts nearly one million annual visitors with its stellar views, cultural events, historic background and well-respected restaurant.
This new issue of MONU will explore how cities of the “Next Eleven” countries are already different and will be different in the future, from the cities of the “BRICs”, but also from the ones of the “MEDCs”- the more economically developed countries – in terms of their politics, their economies, their geographies, their cultures, their social aspects, their technology, their ecology and in the relation to their physical structures, such as their architecture. To investigate what kind of urbanism the cities of the “Next Eleven” countries might develop, this call for submissions for MONU texts, comparative analysis, critical surveys, scientific studies, photo essays, and data-based infographics and research on the topic of “Next Urbanism”. Submissions are due before June 30. More information after the break.
After an intense and highly publicized competition, the Trust for the National Mall has announced the three winning teams selected to redesign the neglected sites of America’s front yard. As reported by the Washington Post, Rogers Marvel Architects &Peter Walkerand Partners will redesign Constitution Gardens east of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, while Weiss/Manfredi&OLIN will bring new life to the Sylvan Theater, southeast of the Washington Monument. The Union Square will be forwarded to the Architect of the Capitol and transformed by Gustafson Guthrie Nichol&Davis Brody Bond.
Continue reading for more on the winning proposals.
The Garage Center for Contemporary Culture – a non-profit international arts space based in Moscow founded by Daria Zhukova – has unveiled plans for a new building in Gorky Park. Designed by OMA, Garage Gorky Park will renovate the famous 1960s Vremena Goda (Seasons of the Year) restaurant, a prefabricated concrete structure that has been derelict for more than two decades. Garage is expected to complete and occupy this 5,400-square-meter building sometime next year, with plans to later expand to the nearby Hexagon pavilion (or Machine Pavilion).
Rem Koolhaas: “We were able, with our client and her team, to explore the qualities of generosity, dimension, openness, and transparency of the Soviet wreckage and find new uses and interpretations for them; it also enabled us to avoid the exaggeration of standards and scale that is becoming an aspect of contemporary art spaces.”
Metro officials have released six conceptual visions that suggest how the historic Los Angeles Union Station could be transformed by 2050. Preliminary “Vision Boards” were released in a public forum at Union Station last week, and although they are not part of the formal evaluation process, they have ignited an immense amount of public interest in the competition.
In an article posted on The Source, Los Angeles Mayor and Metro Board Chair Antonio Villaraigosa described that this competition is “about preparing for the future.” As plans for the California High-Speed Rail System evolve, it is imperative that Union Station is redeveloped to meet the standards of a 21st century transportation hub.
Continue after the break to view each Vision Board provided by the six well-known practices shortlisted for the competition.
SADAR + VUGA, in collaboration with LENS°ASS Architecten, has been selected as winner of an invited competition to design three new buildings on the Campus Schoonmeersen of the University College Ghent in Belgium. The campus development master plan will include a new building for the Study of Social Work (SOAG), a Sports Hall Extension and the Renovation of Building B that includes the adjoining Student Plaza. This highly anticipated project is expected to commence in late May. Continue after the break to learn more about each new facility.
Steven Holl Architects have just unveiledVirginia Commonwealth University’s new Institute for Contemporary Art. With an inviting sense of openness, the building will form a gateway into the University, linking the city of Richmond to the campus. A dynamic architectural promenade will connect the building’s most important spaces, engaging visitors in a variety of changing perspectives. Flexible spaces throughout the building will be capable of accommodating a vast assortment of exhibitions and performances.
Continue after the break for more images and the architect’s project description.
CIVITAS, the organizer of the Reimagining the Waterfront, has announced the winners of the ideas competition for the design of the East River Esplanade between 60th and 125th in New York City bound by the East River to the East and the FDR Drive to the west. Joseph Wood of New Jersey, USA; Takuma Ono and Darina Zlateva of New York City, USA and Matteo Rossetti of Italy claimed first, second and third prize respectively. The competition aspires to bring to new and fresh ideas to the conversation about this waterfront, which over the years has had many issues of disrepair. Anyone who has attempted to bike down this path can appeal to just how unpleasant it can be – massive potholes that take up the whole path, traffic rushing by just a foot away just beyond a shoulder (which is not provided everywhere) and cobbled paths that create a bumpy ride. The proximity to the East River, and the views of Randall’s Island, Queens, Roosevelt Island and the Queensboro Bridge are its saving grace.
There have already been many talks about the state of the East River Esplanade, particularly that it stops abruptly at East 53rd street at the foot of the Queensboro Bridge and starts up again around East 38th street. Last summer MAS, an organization in NYC that advocates for intelligent urban planning, design and preservation, hosted a day-long charette to design an esplanade along the ConEd piers located between East 38th and East 41st Streets. MAS appealed to the community for ideas for “The Next Great NYC Waterfront” and worked alongside W Architecture and Landscape Architecture to produce a report, which can be found here. With CIVITAS’s competition, the issues are again acknowledged to continue brainstorming the future of the waterfront.
The Architect’s Newspaper reviewed the competition winners in an article by Tom Stoelker, which are imaginative and considered. The proposals of the winners and honorable mentions will be exhibited at the Museum of the City of New York between June 6th and September 2012 which will give the public access to some possibilities for the future of the East River Esplanade.
Join us after the break for more on the proposals.
The American Institute of Architects (AIA) and its Committee on the Environment (COTE) have selected the top ten examples of sustainable architecture and green design solutions. Now in its 16th year, the COTE Top Ten Green Projects program is one of the profession’s best known recognition program for sustainable design excellence.
The highlighted projects are the result of a thoroughly integrated approach to architecture, natural systems and technology. They have made a positive contribution to their communities, improved comfort for building occupants and reduced environmental impacts through strategies such as reuse of existing structures, connection to transit systems, low-impact and regenerative site development, energy and water conservation, use of sustainable or renewable construction materials, and design that improves indoor air quality.
All the projects will be honored at the AIA 2012 National Convention and Design Exposition, next month in Washington, D.C. Continue after the break to review the top ten green projects.
In Upstate New York, residents are clamoring to raze down their Government Center, Paul Rudolph’s classic 1970 example of brutalist design. Ostensibly, this is due to flood-damage. But it can’t hurt that, as one resident was quoted in The New York Times as saying, it’s “a big ugly building.”
In Minnesota, city officials would rather tear down M. Paul Fiedberg’s Peavey Plaza, a “Modernist gem” completed in ’73, than spend the time, money, and effort to revitalize it.
In Baghdad, on the other hand, a gymnasium completed in 1982, suffering the signs of decades of violence, poverty, and ill-executed renovation, has sparked a small preservation movement, reawakening a country to its neglected cultural heritage.
The architect behind this Iraqi endeavor? None other than Le Corbusier himself.
Read More on the “forgotten” Le corbusier in Baghdad, after the break…
MONU – magazine on urbanism is a unique bi-annual international forum for artists, writers and designers that are working on topics of urban culture, development and politics.
Each issue collects essays, projects and photographs from contributors from all over the world to a given topic. Thus MONU examines the rural as a strict counterpart to the urban as it appears to be a condition of the past. At least, this is what Kees Christiaanse posits in an interview with us entitled “The New Rural: Global Agriculture, Desakotas, and Freak Farms”. He points out that, today, non-urban spaces interact so frequently and intensely with urbanity that you can no longer describe something as strictly rural. Therefore, we can no longer separate the city from the countryside as these are not polarized entities and each other’s enemies, but rather the result of each other.
They have just released their latest issue on the topic of “Non-Urbanism”. You can see more about the articles on their official website. Also, you can browse the entire issue (video after the break).
